CENSORED 45: AINSLEY

The first and immediate problem I’ve caused myself is not wearing any dang underwear. I was so eager to give my powder keg easy access I didn’t take the time to consider whether I really wanted to or just thought I wanted to because I’d been denied it.

That problem earns me an awkward bench-sitting moment where Beckett places his hand on my thigh. The touch, in itself, is fine. He’s as tactile as me, and I welcome the intimacy, needing it a heck of a lot more than I realized. Except, he starts sliding his hand higher and higher until it’s moving under the hem of my short dress. I definitely am not ready for that.

It isn’t that I’ll never be ready, but even my desire for Luke didn’t come instantly. When I’d finally thrown myself at him, I’d already decided that was how far I wanted to go with him, right over the waterfall. We built a trust parachute over time. A safety prop where I felt comfortable enough to approach him for more, knowing he’d never take more than was being offered to him. Luke’s always just wanted to see me safe like that was his primary goal, and even his rejection, while it stung like a jellyfish, centered around his desire to protect me. Being ready to jump with Luke doesn’t mean I’m ready to jump in general. I’ve just started getting to know Beckett. We need parachute-building time before we’re vacationing at any waterfalls.

So, I extract us from that precarious situation, and Beckett takes me where he intended to originally, his favourite place on campus. It requires climbing through a Registry window he uses exclusively for this purpose to the space between the buildings and the barrier that surrounds the academy parameter. We definitely are not supposed to be here. It’s reckless in a fun way, and I start to really, really enjoy myself.

Despite knowing the barrier’s goal is to cage me, I still can’t deny its beauty. The swirl of colours is like a giant version of the Spark Ring as tall as the buildings and circling around the whole academy. When I push against the surface, instead of sucking me into its gaping vortex like the Spark Ring had, it repels me in the opposite direction like a reverse magnet.

“This is…” I hangfire.

“The wall I want to tear down,” he announces.

“It might take a little more than my wrecking ball to accomplish that,” I report.

He laughs and wraps his arm around me. We walk along beside it with me trailing my fingers over the surface. This is nice. It’s super casual and nothing feels forced. We’re just being together, spending time getting to know each other. We talk about our families and friends, share ridiculous childhood stories, and make it through three full laps around the academy before things start to get reckless not in a fun way.

The second problem I’ve caused myself is trusting Beckett to be alone with me when I really don’t know anything about him. That problem is compounded by me being cocky. I thwart his advances at first and even slap his hand when he starts getting more brazen about it by grabbing my butt. What I should do at this point is call it a night and leave him here to jerk off into the rainbow. This is where being cocky hits me hard. I stupidly assume I can handle myself. I’m not some damsel, and I reckon I’ll just kick the junk off him if he crosses the line. Except, I don’t figure out what that line is until he crosses it in a major freaking way by pushing me up against the back of the Registry wall. Hindsight, right? What a blitzer.

“I think we’re done here,” I unholster. “If you’re asking for my consent to move this forward, my answer is no. Big. Blitzing. No.”

He gives me that beautiful smile with all the teeth, but there’s something off in his eyes. They aren’t the soft brown-grey eyes I’ve gazed longingly into this past week. They’re darker, and they aren’t at all soft.

His lips crash into mine, and though I’m not kissing him back, he isn’t dissuaded, shoving his tongue in my mouth like that might change my mind. So, naturally, I bite his tongue to get it the heck out of me. He lurches back and holds his mouth closed for a minute, but that isn’t going to be the end of it. I’ve turned this into a game for him. Not the kind of game I like to play.

“You like it rough? I can do rough,” he purrs.

He twirls me around with my front facing the wall. I’m not good with defence when some jerkwad is behind me, but I try my best anyway, thrashing against his hold and fighting like heck to get free. He pins my hands at my back and pushes me harder into the wall while I continue to struggle.

“Let me freaking go,” I lock and load. “I’m not playing around.”

“Should we establish a safe word?” he murmurs in my ear, pressing himself right against me from behind, showing me just how much he isn’t playing.

“The safe word is let me freaking go, or I’ll break your junk off and shove it up your butt,” I discharge.

He laughs like that’s a funny joke. Well, I’m not laughing, especially when I hear his pants zipper going down. I jerk my head back trying to knock his face, but with my hands restrained behind me, he’s far enough away to evade my strike. This squib has absolute control over me.

My sparks start going haywire trying to help me. Only, this slug scab isn’t a wielder. There’s nowhere for them to run to, no channel for release, so they just bang against the barrier trying desperately to come to my aid yet unable to help me in any freaking way. They start panicking, increasing my temperature and flailing wildly as they grow volatile. My shackle roars its lack of consent, bellowing incessantly as my sparks continue to wreak havoc inside me.

That’s the precise moment I realize the third problem I’ve caused myself. The biggest one by a long shot. My saviour isn’t coming. I broke the tether binding him to my shackle without a single thought about the consequences of that choice. Hat-trick achievement unlocked. Triple score awarded to me for glorious jackassery.

As Beckett starts to hike up my dress from the back, the movement taking him longer since I never yield, I hear a voice I know well. A voice that on countless occasions has made me want to heave in my mouth from his incessant idolatry of S.W.O.R.D. But in this moment, I’ll take each and every single one of those words and cherish them with my whole dang heart because they’re my freedom.

“Beckett,” Pritchett says quietly. “What’s going on?”

When Beckett steps back to acknowledge his brother, I get the advantage I need. I flip around to face him, then I just start punching him.

And punching him.

And punching him.

And punching him.

Blood shoots out from his face, a geyser splashing all over my dress and painting me in freedom freaking red. Now he’s falling to the ground, and I start kicking him.

And kicking him.

And kicking him.

And kicking him.

In the sides.

In the face.

In the knees.

For my finishing move, I stomp down on his junk so hard I hear it snap under my shoe before the heel skewers his jewels.

Game.

Freaking.

Over.

I leave his pathetic butt there broken and bleeding. My shackle stops roaring curses at him the second I give him my back. I pause in front of Pritchett, wiping the tears from my face I hadn’t even realized I was crying.

“Are you okay?” he whispers.

“No, but I will be...because of you.” I lean in and kiss him on the cheek. “Thank you.”

I find the open window and crawl back through it, adjust my dress, and straighten my hair. Fiona and Atlas, as well as some others, are at the tables in the library. As much as I want to run to Atlas right now, I have to keep it together, and I won’t be able to do that in his arms.

I’m safe. Nothing really happened despite how terrible it could’ve been. And I beat the ever strafing snot out of Beckett as his punishment for failing to listen to my lack of consent. It’s done and over. Letting myself break down over this isn’t an option.

I storm my way out of the Registry into the corridor, destination Dormitory. I just need to grab some pyjamas, and some dang underwear, then I’ll head to the showers to wash this epic chaos storm away. It’s done. It’s over. Beckett’s far worse off than me by a million kilometres.

I nearly trip at the entrance of our room and kick my heels in the direction of the wall like it’s their fault. I have Luke’s attention instantly.

“That good, huh?” he backwashes.

A big part of me wants nothing more than to run into his arms and wail like a freaking crybaby. But that part, no matter how big, is a worthless wussy, so I stow the heck out of it and ignore him instead. I go to my dresser with the intention of grabbing what I need in a hurry and getting the heck out.

“Did he even get it out of his pants?” he splashes.

He can’t just take the win of my silence and keep his gaping fish flaps shut, can’t give me two minutes to pull my crap together. Those feelings of helplessness and fear are swept up by my fury. I grab the closest thing to hand, my Sparklet, but I’m shaking so bad I knock it to the floor. My second swipe lands me my framed Big. Blitzing. No. composition. I hurl it at him with force. He deflects it with a finger flick and spurt of wielded water. The frame embeds perfectly in the wall underneath the window, the corner entering the plaster in just the right way it doesn’t break a dang thing.

I could leave it at that. Of course, that isn’t going to happen because I’ve gotten a taste of rage, and it’s dang delicious compared to the crap I was eating before it. My eyes shoot to my rainbow rose, a gift that’s precious to me. A chance to heal. To grow. To be a better version of myself. A true thing of beauty. I can’t ruin it. I won’t. I have to control myself.

I draw a deep, calming breath. Except, calming myself even slightly leads me to remembering what happened with Beckett and opens up the wound to twice the size, that memory flowing through me like molten lava. The only thing within reach for me to grab is my treasure. I grip it in my fist and squeeze and squeeze, and where Frank enhanced it, crushing it is like breaking a glass in my palm. It does not die quietly. It shatters, splintering and leaving shards of various sizes as retribution for my killing it.

Once I realize what I’ve done, what I’ve destroyed in my inability to control my emotions, something dies in me too. I’ve ruined something valuable to me like I ruin everything else I touch. There’s no more rage. Or sadness. Or helplessness. There’s only this hollow feeling in my chest in the wake of all those emotions. I thought I was unbreakable, but here I am broken, a shell of the thing I once was.

I turn and leave the room. I don’t storm out. I just numbly start toward the bathroom, my palm leaving a trail of red tears where I should be crying from my eyes. I strip down and start the shower, wanting to wash the whole world away. I slide down the wall, draw my legs up to my chest, and wrap my arms around them. I drop my head to my knees and start silently crying, a pitiful sob void of volume. My shoulders shake in the release while tears pour from my eyes, joining the blood trailing down my shin from the broken rainbow rose shards still cutting into my palm. I don’t feel it. I don’t feel anything, so completely and utterly shattered I’ll never be put back together again.

But my sparks aren’t going to cry silently. They slosh over the edges of my well. My shackle wails in solidarity. They cry far louder than me, and I don’t have the strength to stall the inevitable, can’t find the will to. I reckon if I’m imploding, a shower stall is probably the safest place I can do that. So, I just let my sparks have their moment, leave them free to their chaos as I continue to weep with my face buried in my knees.